Peace and future cannon fodder
by Ketojan
Summary: The Sole Survivor, Naomi Eastwood seems to have vanished with little of a trail to go on. Nick Valentine is forced to search the Commonwealth for her, after hearing some disturbing news regarding the Brotherhood. Teaming up with Hancock, the Synth gets out his tattered hat and trench coat once more, ready to find Naomi and prevent another conflict as a child's life depends on it.
1. Chapter 1

The tired eyes of the watchman slowly scanned the horizon as his fingers slowly danced over the grip of his revolver. He could see some dots on the horizon, fiery ones, monsters on the warpath. Thankfully they came into contact with another group and quickly killed eachother off.

Jamaica Plains...

Whoever thought that **this** shithole would make a good settlement?

It was then that he noticed how the silence was being broken, by someone slowly approaching footsteps. His eyes quickly darted across the landscape and locked onto whoever was currently approaching him. He swiftly drew his gun and turned to face them, taking aim but quickly held his fire as he saw a tattered machine who stood mere inches away. A grey Android, gen 2 if he wasn't mistaken, the mechanical detective who's mask had been long since torn.

"Jesus John, when was the last time you got some sleep?" Nick asked, pulling a cigar from his coat pocket and sticking it between his teeth.

John rolled his eyes and lowered the gun, slowly down to his holster.

"Jesus Valentine, I would've thought that a man of your years would know better than to sneak up on someone when they're on watch!" He said, sounding rather sharp as he watched the Synth light up.

"I didn't..." Nick's lighter needed a bit of encouragement before it lit the tip of his stoogie, prompting him to give it a good shake.

"I walked up to you, you just weren't paying attention."

John simply sighed, looking out to the horizon again as he saw what was left of the battle that had taken place there.

"My attention was elsewhere..." He admitted, looking back to his synthetic guest.

"What d'you want, Nick?"

"Hancock..." He said, as if John should already know it. Though in truth, why would anyone else come out to **this** part of the commonwealth.

"Heh... Well, I'll be...

Nick Valentine actually looking to spend some time with Hancock, what is it, April first?" The Watchman mocked, giving Nick a slight smirk, sadly Nick wasn't exactly in the mood for jokes.

"Hancock..."

With a sigh, John gestured to the town, Hancock was usually found farming in that old parking lot. He said it 'helped him stop thinking' and reminded him of some good times, collecting 'herbs.'

"Take care John..." Valentine said as he began to walk away, leaving the watchman to go back to his duties, staring out onto the horizon.

* * *

"Argh... Son of a!" Hancock stopped so that he could suck the blood from his fingers. His skin split so easily sometimes, making farming without gloves a bitch. He was offered a set of farming clothes but if he caught himself dressed like that, he'd have to kick his own ass.

"Hancock, at least put the gloves on for christ's sake..." A Red Haired settler insisted, though the Ghoul shook his head.

"Nah, best save them for the kind of wuss who needs them."

"Well, put a bucket on my head and call me a protectron." A familiar voice said, calling out from behind him and swiftly getting the ghoul's attention as he glanced over his shoulder. This was the last thing he needed.

 _Argh shit..._

"Nick... Should've known that Naomi would've gone back to you, the lure of poking her nose in other people's business was always one that she struggled to resist." The Ghoul said, slowly rising up to his feet and dusting himself off with his hands, thankfully his coat was red, so the blood from his paper cut didn't show up very well.

"Not that I can blame her of course. Whenever her life gets dull she often finds herself blundering into a more interesting one." He said, cracking a faint chuckle.

"How's she doing?"

Nick furrowed his brow, seeming concerned by his answer.

"I was hoping that **you'd** tell **me.** " The Synth said, glancing down to the ring around Hancock's neck, tied down by a chain.

Though she hadn't officially told anyone, Naomi and Hancock had had a thing going for some time now. The ring just proved it as she wouldn't give it to just **anyone**.

"Heh, I see, well I haven't seen her in nearly a month either. She's probably on that island of hers. You know how she gets her head immersed in building shit and coordinating the place."

"MacCready's confirmed that she hasn't been there either, not for a few weeks at least. It's... Concerning that she'd just disappear."

"You think someone took her?" Hancock asked, curiously, though he was disappointed when Valentine shook his head.

"There have been sightings of her. Diamond City, she's been to the hair dressers there and had some major work done. The Island also said that she spent the best part of three days crafting a... robot of some kind."

"So? She's out playing with her new robot." Hancock shrugged, not understanding where the old bucket of bolts was going with this.

"I think she's more likely isolating herself..." Valentine sighed, glancing down to the floor.

"I'm not going to lie, I'm a little concerned."

"Didn't know you cared, Nick." The Ghoul said, giving the Private eye a smirk.

"I could say the same about you, yet here we are." The synth said, with a smirk, glancing off to his left.

"Look erm... If you could keep your ear to the ground and let me know if you hear anything... It'd be a great help."

"Sorry but you're literally standing in the asshole of the commonwealth, no one tells us shit. If I press my ear to the ground of this place, all I'll hear is farts.

I mean, I can give it a shot but..."

"Charming…" Nick murmured, he didn't think that Hancock could stoop so low as to use toilet humour based analogies.

"Still, glad to hear it. I'll keep in touch."

Nick slowly turned away from the Ghoul, wandering out of the parking lot, however, even he knew that he wouldn't get away from Hancock's intuition.

"What aren't you tellin' me?" He asked, getting the Synth to stop dead in his tracks as he slowly turned back around to face his ghoulish comrade, pausing out of hesitation.

"I've heard... Stories...

Reports of Brotherhood activity in the south..."

"Heh, those assholes are coming back for round two? Didn't they see what we did to their flying ship and take a hint?"

"You'd think that...

But they don't look like they're on the offensive, more like the defensive. Like they're protecting something."

"Something... What? They got an Ace up their sleeve or somethin'? What could they even have? Their giant robot was reduced to scrap metal by their collapsing ship."

"Hope, Hancock. They have hope or... believe that they do." The Synth sighed, flicking his cigar away, not even watching as it bounced up the parking lot, spraying sparks in several different directions.

"If what I've heard is right... These folks might just be protecting their future leader. The next Elder, to lead the next generation of Brotherhood." Nick paused to sigh once more, glancing up to the rebellious mayor with a tired gaze.

"If what I've heard is right, these people might be harbouring Maxon's Son."

Hancock fell silent, trying to process this piece of information as it just didn't seem possible.

Arthur Maxon... Had sex?

The one guy who had a face that needed to be hidden behind a power armour faceplate to cover up his ugly mug managed to score? Someone was pulling his leg, surely.

"Ain't he like… Brotherhood royalty or somethin'? It would make sense that they'd keep his family line going but…

The kid can't be any older than five, since the guy was… what, twenty?"

"It's a newborn apparently.

I doubt that Maxon even knew about it. From what I've heard the Brotherhood have spent quite a lot of time tracking the mother down, so that they could retrieve it." The Synth paused, glancing back up to Hancock.

"Naomi needs to know, only she can get the minutemen together to keep the Institute off of that babes' back and if she isn't around to do it, then I'll need to go to Preston myself."

"You think Preston can do it? Keep the Institute off of the Brotherhood's back **and** bring peace between the Minutemen and the Brotherhood?

You have met the guy haven't you?" Hancock asked, seeming amused by that idea. Preston seemed like a well-meaning guy but the Ghoul got the feeling that he needed help tying his boots in the morning, never mind bringing two enemies together and protecting a child from the most dangerous organisation in the world.

"I don't know…

Sounds like he might be more successful in the later but I doubt he'd have much success with the former. Either way, I think that Naomi is the woman for the job. She could smooth talk a Deathclaw into surrendering a Brahmin steak." The Gumshoe said, with a bemused smirk, one that he got back.

"Hmm…

Well, I ain't gonna get much done, elbow deep in Brahmin shit. I might as well come with, see what it's like being a private eye." Hancock shrugged, looking from side to side, he actually wondered what it would be like to be the law and not the guy running from it for a change.

"Heh, like I'd ever allow that." Nick said, though he was mostly being facetious. Though Hancock wouldn't be his first choice as a partner, in fact, he'd probably be somewhere between 4000 and 5000 on his list of people he'd bring along on a case, he knew two things. That Hancock probably knew Naomi better than anyone and now that he'd blabbed that something might be wrong with her? There was no losing the ghoul now, the ghoul was coming, whether Valentine liked it or not and to be honest, he didn't exactly plan on protesting.

"Well, might as well make yourself useful and get yourself some armour."

"Armour?" Hancock asked, drawing his shotgun from his back.

"The hell do we need armour for?"

Valentine paused, giving Hancock a smirk as he slowly drew another cigar, he'd need it if he was going to explain to the ghoul what he had planned. He had a lead, though it was sketchy, it was still worth checking out.

"I might need you to go undercover…"


	2. Chapter 2

Things were quiet, out in the marshy swampland of the southern commonwealth. Other than a few insects, that chirped and the sounds of swishing water as the local wildlife waded through it. One such local, a lone feral ghoul, was making his rounds, scouring the swamp for food.

The creature slowly staggered around, snarling and gagging at its surroundings as it constantly ticked and fidgeted. No one knew what was coursing through its head, whether it still believed that it was human or not or if it even had a concept of humanity.

The husk stopped dragging its feet to examine its surroundings, snapping his teeth at the air.

It was then that it noticed the sounds of gunfire, coming from up ahead, causing the creature's head to snap over to its direction as curiosity got the better of it. The creature simply snarled as it stumbled towards it, gnashing its teeth as it prepared to eat.

* * *

The Feral slowly shuffled over to the source of the sound, where he immediately noticed a dead body that lay at his feet, a headless corpse, chunks of his head were scattered around the zombie's feet.

The creature gave off a low growl as it slowly squatted by the corpse's side and slowly began to tear into the neck stump, greedily shoving the man's flesh into its mouth as it chewed sloppily.

Unfortunately for the abominable creature, its meal was cut short by a loud gunshot, which sent a bullet across the swamp, tearing through its forehead, skull and brain. Within a few seconds it fell to the ground, dead before it knew what hit it.

The Watchman at the Murkwater Construction Site lowered his rifle, smirking under his bandanna. Shame that Gabe was taking a piss, otherwise he'd have bragging rights for a month.

He turned back around as he heard the buzzer of the time out bell, prompting him to approach the shack at the center of the cesspool, where Blue and Red stood before one another, colour coordinated baseball bats in hand.

Everyone was seemingly excited about this round, the 'Asian bitch' on blue had taken out four guys today alone. One guy had his head completely pasted and the one before him had to be carried back to the body dumping truck in a sack.

The last guy shit it and took off, forcing Gabe to shoot him in the back of the head. It sounded harsh but it is rule Number 1 here, 'no pussying out.'

The Next contestant, body number 24 as he'd later be known, approached the stand. He threw his arms wide as the crowd cheered him on, secretly hoping to see the arrogant prick splatter.

The 'Asian bitch' as a lot of the contestants referred to her was a mid thirties Asian-American woman, face concealed by face-paint, darkening her eyes and a bandanna wrapped around her mouth.

The bandanna had a skull depicted on it, rather fitting due to her death toll. Not just here but all over the commonwealth.

According to her pipboy, she'd killed at least 1614 people, since she stumbled out of Vault 111, around a year ago.

Not all of them deserved it but the Wasteland wasn't exactly a nice place...

She wore varying types of armour, all of which was incredibly effective and damage resistant and she wore it on top of a Harness. She didn't normally wear this kind of attire, nor did she ever dream of having a mohawk hairdo. But that was the idea, she needed to appear... Different, to the point that she wasn't recognisable.

Well, without changing her face of course, she had no intentions of doing that.

The young woman's eyes quickly darted up as she saw the next contestant. He was wrapped up in leather armour, looking like he'd never swung a baseball bat in his life.

He underestimated her, gravely...

The man roared in fury, dashing forward and bringing his baseball bat down on her head but quickly fumbling as the oak bat whacked him, square in the knee. He cried out and buckled, oblivious to the fact that Naomi was now holding it above her own head and had brought it down with a great deal of force.

All of this time out here, with the machete, seemed to have paid off as the back of her opponent's skull caved in and he dropped to the ground like a Ragdoll. This resulted in a mixed reaction from the crowd. Some of them were excited to see how many contestants she could kill and the rest just wanted her to bite it, so that someone new would come along.

Either way, surely someone should be able to best her.

Naomi rested her bat on her shoulder, expecting to have to wait another ten minutes for a fight.

However, her wait was cut short as a Ghoul, dressed in a similar fashion to the guy who's head she'd just caved in, stepped into the ring. He snatched the bat off of the floor and gently patted it against his hand as he stared her down with his black eyes.

Naomi decided to make the first move this time, quickly rushing forward and striking her bat down, only to find that it had been deflected by the Ghoul's parry. The Ghoul then ducked down and did a spin kick, sweeping the young woman off of her feet and landing to the floor with a thud, splatting mud several feet in various directions.

The Red Baseball bat was quickly brought down on her, however, Naomi was quick to react and swiftly deflected it by holding her own bat up, causing them both to collide and for the Ghoul to bounce back.

The Sole Survivor rolled back onto her knees and jumped up to her feet before lunging forward. She didn't expect the Ghoul to have any more fight in him but low and behold, he swiftly sidestepped it before ramming the handle into her left cheek, causing her to stumble.

Naomi glanced back up, growling in rage as she spun around, heaving as she put as much force as possible into her next swing, knocking the ghoul down to the floor, spinning and landing with a heavy 'splat' in the mud.

The Leatherbound Ghoul kept himself propped up on his left elbow, panting heavily as he did so and sighing.

He didn't know where his Baseball bat had gone, probably was buried in mud by now...

He felt the gently push of Naomi's boot as she rolled him over, onto his back and looked him in the face. It was courteous to do so before killing such a worthy opponent...

As she slowly raised the bat above her head, her eyes slowly lowered down to his chest... and then she saw it.

The Survivor's eyes widened as they finally processed it.

 _Nait's ring..._

The jeers and encouragement of the crowd became but a blur as she slowly stumbled back, the blood, the rage, the confusion. All of it was shoved to the back of her mind as she faced her lover.

What was he doing out here? Couldn't he see that she wanted to be left alone, to face the demons that haunted her?

Without even realising it, Naomi's baseball bat fell to the floor, landing in the mud as she stared at her hands, seemingly shaken by what she had just done. Not only to Hancock but to... how many people? Ten? Fifteen?

Hancock slowly recognised that she was coming around and gave her a smile with his rotted teeth, grinning a little in realisation that he'd finally won her back over.

"Nice to see you to, love..." He said, facetiously before his head lulled back and he passed out before her, much to the disappointment of the crowd...


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Just thought I'd let you know that this chapter may contain spoilers for the main plot and a minor spoiler for the Automatron DLC.**

* * *

 _That smile..._

"The hell were you thinking, sending Hancock in there!?"

 _That fucking smile..._

"You would've run if I had approached you myself, I was sure that you would've if Hancock approached you as himself as well..."

 _He didn't smile like_ _ **that**_ _when we were kids..._

"Maybe you should have asked me, instead of making assumptions! I mean, Jesus Nick, I could've smashed his head in!"

 _He wasn't my brother, he wasn't even human..._

"The fact that you were willing to 'smash someone's head in' is what brought on my concern to begin with..."

Hancock's eyes slowly opened as he raised his head, the yelling was **not** a pleasant thing to wake up to. What happened anyway? Did he hit the chems too hard again?

The Ghoul slowly sat up and winced as his head left the surface that seemed so soft and gentle... even though it was concrete.

He brought his hand up to his temple, groaning as he did so, blinding light started to intrude into his retina, quickly overwhelming his dim vision.

"It's fight club, Nick. That's kind of the point..."

"I find it hard to believe that the same woman who abolished the combat zone would consider such a thing acceptable, never mind participate in it."

"It's a completely different thing, everyone who steps onto those podiums makes the choice to do so, nobody forces them and anyone can enter.

I needed to be there, to... clear my head."

"Who-Whoah..." Hancock groaned, getting a shocked glare from both of his companions, who hadn't seen him come too.

"Clear your... What're you talking about? What's up? Why'd you have to clear your head?"

Naomi paused and sighed, looking to her squeeze with a pained glare before her eyes fell to the floor, softening for the first time in weeks...

"I...

Had to get away..." The Mother sighed, turning away from them and walking towards the wall, folding her arms.

"From my failures..."

There was a long pause as the two outcasts looked to one another, though they wanted to play dumb, they both knew what she was talking about.

The Institute...

"I can't say that either of us can agreed with your decision but at least, with you at the helm, the Institute could have been something... better.

Or less worse." Nick assured her, getting the Vault Dweller to turn back to him, folding her arms.

"You see, that's **exactly** what I thought! But they..." She paused, scowling under her breath as she glanced back up to Nick.

"I was a figurehead, a puppet.

Sha-... Father, he continued to pull the strings, even after he was dead. Their evil, it couldn't be stopped, not when it was so..." Naomi blinked rapidly as she cut herself off, fighting back several tears that were building up behind her eyes.

"I thought that I could change them, I thought that...

With their resources and my goals, I thought that maybe we could make a better commonwealth. I don't... I don't know, maybe give some of the advancements to the public. Tell those who's relatives were kidnapped what became of their loved ones, recall the synth replacements that aren't wanted.

Stop being the boogie man that we've been labelled as."

She fell silent, hanging her head with a heavy sigh as she glanced up to her companions, stepping forward, so that she wouldn't have to raise her voice.

"When I... Met Isabel I...

Guess I was just reminded, we're so similar...

Good intentions, just gone to shit."

Hancock sighed and slowly pulled himself up to his feet, taking a step forward and putting his hands on her shoulders, Valentine didn't mind as that was all him...

"You know...

You might've screwed up a little but...

Screwin' up at doing the right thing is a million times better than succeeding at doing the wrong. And hell, that shit got complicated as soon as you found your son, you had a lot to consider." The Ghoul explained, doing his best. It wasn't easy, normally he ran from situations like this but looking at where that got Naomi? It probably wasn't the brightest idea...

"I... Don't even know anymore..." The Sole Survivor admitted, with a sigh, looking over to Valentine.

"I need more time..."

The Synth stepped forward, sighing heavily as he drew another cigar, feeling that he'll need it.

"I'm afraid that time isn't exactly on our side, not if the rumours are true." He said, through gritted teeth, gritted to keep his cigar in place of course...

"Rumours?" Naomi asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Wh-What rumours?"

Hancock stepped back, deciding that this was Nick's case and that he'd need to handle things from here...

"Apparently you have unfinished business with the Brotherhood." The Synth explained, looking over to Hancock.

"There's been activity in the south, organised activity. Not sure if they're on the offensive or not but...

If rumours are true, they're travelling with Arthur Maxon's son... I don't think I need to tell you why that's a concern..."

Naomi nodded, falling silent before looking up to Hancock.

"I guess... This changes things.

If the Institute find out about that baby, they might think that killing him is a tactical advantage." She sighed, glancing to the floor.

Letting that child die wasn't acceptable. She of all people knew why that was abominable. If it was 100% down to her, the surviving Brotherhood members would be given sanctuary and escorted out of the commonwealth.

Sadly, it wasn't up to her or else she wouldn't be out here...

"Do the minutemen know?" She asked, curiously, looking back over to Nick.

"No, not that I'm aware...

I've been careful about who I tell, since I wanted to know what your angle on this whole thing was. I'm glad that you remembered that the child's a human being first, not that I had any doubts but... I can understand how war can distort your view on such things..."

"Yeah..." Naomi agreed, looking up to Nick.

"I'm **not** the Institute, I'm aware of what we're dealing with.

We're going to have to make contact with the Remnants of the Brotherhood of Steel and track this baby down.

Then we'll have to tell Preston, so that he can keep watch over it and finally, we need to make sure that the Institute don't send a Courser after them or something." Naomi insisted, getting a determined nod from the both of them, that seemed more than fair.

"That sounds like a three person job and given that Naomi is the only one with Institute access, her work's been cut out for her. Provided that they don't mind her new haircut.

That just leaves me and Hancock... And the Brotherhood aren't on a crusade to kill all ghouls, not yet anyway, so I think he'd be safer than me if he were to approach them. Me and Preston aren't on bad terms, not last time I checked anyway, so I can go up to the castle and get him up to speed."

"Great, I'll beam myself into the Institute now and see what's what. You two okay on your own?" Naomi asked, raising her pipboy up to her eye as she set it up.

"Yeah, we found you didn't we? I think we can handle it from here..." Hancock said, with a smirk. Part of him wanted to see this 'beaming' thing as he hadn't witnessed it first hand before. It sounded... interesting.

Naomi stepped forward and gave Hancock a gentle kiss over the chapped flakes that used to be his lips, evaporating mid kiss as she exploded into tiny particles. This caused the Ghoul to stumble back, seeming impressed by her ability to hop from one place to another.

He blinked a few times, to ensure that what he had witnessed was indeed real before he looked over to Valentine, who's confidence seemed to have faded as soon as Naomi was out of view. He glared at him with a worried gaze, eyes rather soft as he looked deep in thought.

" _For last year's words belong to last year's language  
And next year's words await another voice." _


	4. Chapter 4

_Great... Just great..._

Hancock slowly wandered the streets of Downtown Boston, heading up north as he waded through the rubble.

He could hear gunfire all around him, bombs detonating, screams of mutants and gunners as they locked arms and fought to the death.

This wasn't exactly his scene, he loved a bit of violence but out here? Everyone was as bad as eachother, killing becomes a chore and there's no progress to be made. This is the sort of situation where one would just sit back, relax, take a bit of jet and enjoy the show and then maybe kick the shit out of whoever was left.

Fortunately, this wasn't his mess to clean up as he had more important things to do. Valentine had a lead on where these Brotherhood Remnants were staying, an old listening post towards the North of the Commonwealth. The Ghoul had been up that way, once or twice, with Naomi.

Hell, they'd been everywhere...

He could vaguely remember the place, looting it months ago and spending the night there. This was before they were an item or else it would probably have bared witness to some legendary love making.

Still, it was pretty fresh in his head, the chems hadn't managed to phase those memories out just yet...

The Ghoul kept his guard up, clutching Omar, his personal double barrel shotgun, and slowly lifting it so that he had the path ahead in his sights as he could swear that he could hear the heavy footsteps of a Supermutant up ahead.

Given that he was wearing a bright red coat, Hancock wasn't exactly dressed for stealth, still, the mutant would probably walk right past him, allowing him to blow its head off before it got a whiff of him.

Provided that the dumb shit didn't look left...

Hancock readied himself, kneeling down and taking aim. Shame that he couldn't take out a few more of these mutie bastards. Not that he had anything against Supermutants. Well, the none feral ones like Strong at least.

It was just that these creatures marched the Commonwealth, looking for a fight and Hancock was happy to oblige.

The Mutant stepped out in front of him, almost like he was preparing for a slapstick routine as he looked from side to side.

"Urgh... Was someone there!?" The Mutant grunted, blissfully unaware that Hancock was ready to feed him the punchline...

 _3..._

 _2..._

Before the number one even came into Hancock's head, the green giant's head exploded, like a melon that had been whacked with a sledgehammer. Its body fell to the ground, crumpling before the eyes of the man who was meant to kill it, who just stared at it, bewildered.

"Shit Omar, didn't know you were **that** good..." The Ghoul grumbled, slowly rising to his feet and looking around for his assailant. However, they quickly made themselves known to him as they stepped out of an alley to his left.

Three synths, Skeletal robots, Gen 1, marched over to him.

Naomi probably sent them to keep an eye on him, at least, that was his original deduction. However, he quickly realised how much this would add to his problems if she had arranged such a thing.

For a start, the Brotherhood shoot Synths on site, Hancock would be lucky if they weren't going to shoot him on his own, never mind with an entourage of robot buddies.

Second, Naomi wouldn't doubt him this much, Hancock didn't need a bunch of vrolik bots following him into battle.

"Hey assholes, I was about to do that!" Hancock snapped, seeming angered by their intrusion. That would've been a nice kill, if those over-glorified vacuum cleaners hadn't blundered into it and stole it.

"Subject: John McDonagh."

"Hancock..." The Ghoul corrected him, giving them a dark glare. McDonagh was about the most insulting thing he could be called.

"John McDonagh, registered threat against Institute operations. Eastwood's protocols state that you must be terminated."

"You're busted..." Hancock grumbled, wondering what the fuck this rust bucket was going on about. Still, he noted the name 'Eastwood,' did Naomi have something to do with this?

"You **must** be **terminated**." It concluded, raising its white institute rifle but not fast enough as he was immediately blown in half by Omar and sent flying back across the street as its buddies quickly raised their pistols and fired.

Hancock quickly smashed the butt of his shotgun into the face of the nearest synth and took it as a near-human hostage, letting it absorb two fusion cells to the chest before firing straight at his buddy, blowing him away to and sending his arms, legs and head spinning through the air.

The final synth was just thrown to the floor, it seemingly didn't survive the beating that it took.

However, it's leader did...

Hancock could see that the rifle synth was slowly crawling towards him, seemingly trying to keep up the fight, not letting the fact that he didn't have legs stop him. In all honesty, Hancock found that he had some respect for it. The machine had determination, he'd give it that.

"Terminate... John... Mc-" With a small clatter, the Synth's head was pressed against the floor by Hancock's boot, it was pinned down, preventing it from moving.

"Did Naomi send you?"

"Warning... System... Critical... Need... Maint-"

Hancock rolled his eyes and ground his heel onto the tin can's skull, crushing its left eyesocket in and destroying its retina.

"Ob-b-b-b-b-b-bjective: Loc-c-c-c-c-cate and term-inate Unit Designation M-M-M-M7-N-n-n-n-n-n-n 97. R-R-stration: DN-f-f-f-f-f-f-40-s-s-s-s-s-7..."

"Heh, cute nickname you got for me." The Ghoul grinned as he loaded the last of his shells into the shotgun.

"Shame that you weren't a human synth...

Could've tortured some info out of you." He shrugged, blowing the machine's head off and making sure that it was at a definite end.

With that, Hancock marched off towards his destination, slinging Omar over his shoulder as he made his way towards the abandoned listening post, hoping that he wasn't going to go through all of this crap just to be shot by the Brotherhood.


	5. Chapter 5

Hancock slowly approached Listening Post Bravo with some degree of trepidation. Hancock wasn't exactly sure what was going on and he hated it, not knowing your enemy was akin to starting a fight with a guy who was ten times bigger than you and ten times better armed. Hell, he didn't even know if this Brotherhood Outpost were indeed hostile towards him, though he could guess...

The Ghoul booted the steel door open as Omar was slowly poked inside, both barrels slowly scanned the room before the gun's owner stepped inside. Taking a tight grip of his weapon, Hancock quickly stepped around the door's protection and took aim inside, only to find that the place had long since been abandoned. His black eyes quickly scanned the room before he sighed heavily and lowered his weapon.

Before him stood a ransacked office of some sorts, with two terminals, one on a desk, one mounted on a wall, next to an elevator. Presumably the two machines were linked. The rest of the room, including the caged armoury had long since been looted, he knew this because he and Naomi passed through the area some time ago.

With a heavy sigh, Hancock stepped on over to the Elevator and pushed the button, it would seem that it was currently in use downstairs. The Ghoul glanced down to the panel, realising that it was possibly full of Brotherhood soldiers, who may or may not have a suit of power armour, as a result, he quickly ran around the desk and ducked down, readying his shotgun.

Within seconds he heard a 'ding' as the door slowly rattled open and two heavy footsteps could be heard, emerging from the elevator, accompanied by the light spooling of a minigun.

"Alright freak, I'm only going to say this once. You have nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. I can turn you to paste in seconds with this gun, come out from behind the desk, with your hands up!" The voice was very... Soldier like, quite authoritative. It was also being projected out of a speaker on the knight's bucket-head helmet.

"Put a scratch on this armour and I swear that I'll annihilate you, no matter what. Surrender now and I promise that no harm will come to you."

Hancock sighed heavily, weighing up his options. This guy DEFINITELY had the upper hand. Should the ghoul jump up and blast him with his shotgun, he'd immediately get shredded and he'd do fuck all by way of damage. That and if he surrendered, he would be taken down to the lower levels of this place as a guest. Well... A prisoner but he could find out more information.

With a heavy sigh, Hancock slowly rose from behind the desk, shotgun snapped so that it wasn't loaded as he stared the Soldier in the faceplate.

The Soldier slowly paced around his ghoulish prisoner, gesturing for Hancock to drop his gun to the floor. A command that Hancock obeyed, albeit reluctantly as the weapon landed to the floor with a clatter.

"Get into the elevator, hands raised."

The Ghoul nodded and stepped on over to it, hands raised and pressed them against the wall as he hung his head and sighed. He could hear the big, metal idiot's footsteps following him inside and the irritating 'beep' of the elevator door being activated and the metal doors slowly coming to a close.

"I gotta say..." The Ghoul said, slowly lowering his hands and turning to the Power Armoured boyscout with a smirk.

"I really like your new digs, very fitting, giving its... Military feel."

"This base is the only worthwhile place that the Brotherhood has control over." The Soldier replied, not taking his eyes off of the ghoul.

"It was used by the Brotherhood long before they fell."

"Yeah and what a mighty fall it was huh? Fallin' from the sky and being buried underground?"

"Save it, the Irony isn't lost on me but in terms of our operations, it is... adequate. It's the only place that the Institute will let us operate in, in peace."

"Y'know, I'm pretty sure that Naomi would've let you operate in other places, if you didn't shoot on sight."

"No, she wouldn't. If she knew what we were housing in here, she'd have the place overrun with synths until it and the rest of us were destroyed."

"You mean Maxton's kid?" Hancock asked, glancing up to the Soldier, who even though his face was expressionless, conveyed that he was truly shocked by the fact that the Ghoul already knew about it.

"Yeah, we know..."

"So they sent **you** to destroy it?"

"No, course not. They wouldn't trust **me** to do it, hell the Institute doesn't even know. Naomi does, her friends do and now, through a series of events too weird, even for me, I know as well."

"So you were sent here for what? Blackmail?"

Hancock's answer was cut short as the door bleeped to signal their arrival, the door swiftly opened and the Ghoul instantly found himself face to face with three lesser dressed soldiers in black armour, pointing laser rifles straight at his face.

"Paladin, you were able to capture him alive." The Soldier said, breathlessly, lowering his weapons as he saw that the situation was under control.

"Yes and I'm thankful that I did. It seems that the situation isn't what we originally thought." The 'Paladin' replied, stepping out of the elevator with his power armour's vice-like grip around Hancock's right arm as he yanked him forward.

"This intruder isn't here by accident and he says that he isn't a direct agent of the Institute but an ally of their director, Naomi. I intend to interrogate him to find out more."

"Or you could ask." Hancock shrugged, rather passive aggressively as he veered off to the side, catching the eye of a Brotherhood soldier who furiously struck at a nearby workbench with her hammer, seemingly improving a set of armour. The Ghoul slowly examined the room, seeing the Brotherhood remnants sat around the room, moping at desks and preparing a meal at the center in a cooking pot. They looked so... depressed, so run down and lacking of any and all hope. These people weren't an army, far from it, they were refugees.

The Paladin quickly marched over to his prisoner, poking him in the back with the barrel of his minigun. The Ghoul was treated to a guided tour through the encampment as he wandered his way around the many dials and bits of radio equipment as the two of them headed towards a hole in the wall. Hancock quickly glanced back over his shoulder, to make sure that they were supposed to be crawling in there but quickly found that something else caught his eye instead.

On the far side of the room, heavily guarded by two Brotherhood soldiers, armed with assault rifles stood a baby-blue cot, with two small hands reaching up out of it. The Ghoul paused, seeing that Maxon had in fact gotten laid at some point.

Hancock then felt a sharp sting, forcing him to stumble forward as the minigun was rammed into his lower back.

"Keep moving freak, no child should be forced to look on such a monstrosity." The Paladin grunted, getting Hancock to grumble under his breath as he slowly moved along.

" _Well, good thing he never got to meet his dad then..."_

After the two of them navigated the small cave-like room, that was unused, due to the radioactive water that was inside it, Hancock was eventually shoved into an isolated room. The room was seemingly collapsed for the most part, scorch marks could be seen on the wall immediately to the left and a big landslide of rubble could be seen, opposite the entrance. To call this place a mess would be honouring it.

"Forgive the shoddiness of these surroundings but we'll be needing privacy for our little talk..." The Paladin informed him, slowly removing his helmet and revealing his face. He was a rather rugged man in his 30s/40s with a rough beard and a full head of jet black hair, multiple scars around his face from service injuries.

The Paladin's helmet landed with a thud on the floor, he stared straight into Hancock's black eyes as he lowered his minigun.

"I am Paladin Danse, acting leader of the Brotherhood of Steel and guardian of the Maxon bloodline. Right now, you are here as a prisoner, under my protection and you're going to tell me everything."

Hancock glanced up to the Paladin, mildly impressed by his prepared announcement as he took a black office chair from a nearby desk and wheeled it wound, placing it in front of Danse and taking a seat on it with a slight smirk.

"Gladly."


	6. Chapter 6

A clap of thunder erupted in the sky above the Mirkwater Construction site and a lightning bolt struck at the earth. Naomi quickly materialised before the lightning bolt vanished, machete still in hand, fresh blood leaking off of its tip.

Naomi was used to teleporting in and out of the Institute, as much as she hated it, she no longer felt dizzy or sick from it. She wasn't too concerned that people had witnessed her arrival as most, if not all of them would be dead by this time next week. The nature of the Construction site fight club somewhat demanded it.

She sighed heavily, examining her machete before holstering it. In truth, she hadn't really been into blades before this, she preferred to take her targets out at range. Yet, somehow, she could no longer do it. Aiming down the scope, taking a breath and concentrating her fire, all of it felt like a huge burden these days. Her head was full of voices, her voices, conflicting with one another like an unhappy marriage and she felt like the child who was forced to bare witness. The arguing of her conscience and her sub-conscience took its toll on her patience, she felt trapped, frustrated and...

Lost...

"I'll never understand how you don't get sick from that..." Valentined said, seeming materialising behind her. You'd think that he was the one who teleported in.

Naomi glanced over to him, glad to see him as his voice silenced the other voices. She was surprised that she didn't notice the clicking and clunking of his internal systems...

"Hey Valentine, how'd it go?"

Valentine sighed, flicking his cigarette into the bog, just hoping that it didn't flick off of some poor bastard's brain.

"About as well as you'd expect... We should keep Preston in the loop more often, given that he commands your army."

"He doesn't, he just makes sure that they stay on task, the idea of leading scares him." Naomi sighed, looking back over to him.

"I think he'd be a good leader to be honest, maybe he will be one day..."

"Well, either way, he said that he'll let Ronny and the other senior members know. Too bad we can't use the radio to inform everyone at once..."

"Aye... That **would** be ideal, wouldn't it?"

The Sole Survivor glanced over to the arena, hearing the beating of the two coloured bats clashing against one another. Fifteen people had died at this point, fifteen lives had been thrown away for the dream of being the king of the arena. Nobody stays 'king' for long, a week at most and then they get thrown in the back of that old truck with their 'subjects.'

Such a waste of life but with civilization comes trivia... Too much of it leads to the world that they live in now.

"Any news from Hancock?" Nick asked, realising that his companion had seemingly zoned out, he missed the days when conversations between them didn't suddenly go one sided.

"No..." Naomi sighed, glancing back over to him.

"Though I wasn't expecting him to be, to be honest... I sent him so that they'll know our intentions ahead of time, so that they won't shoot us on sight."

"So he's... bait?" Nick asked, he was somewhat concerned as that was rather... cold. Putting someone so close to her in harm's way didn't really seem like her style, though, then again, she wouldn't risk him getting killed...

Would she?

"Not really, he's more like the advanced guard. He'll tell them everything that we know and they'll keep him as a hostage, to make sure that we don't just shoot them on sight. Then we can explain that we want to help them leave the Commonwealth."

"Assuming that they want to of course..." Nick grumbled, trying to keep the fighting out of his line of sight.

"What if they want to stay?"

Naomi shrugged, in truth, it was of no consequence to her. They weren't powerful enough to be a real threat and in truth, she had little against the Brotherhood... Well, not it's individual members.

"Then we let 'em, under our terms."

Valentine nodded, falling silent. It seemed like an acceptable arrangement, he was just glad that she had the sense to not go on a vengeance fuelled crusade against the Brotherhood, not that he had expected her to mind.

"Well then, let's get going... Brotherhood haven't heard from us in nearly a year now, I'm sure that they'll be eager to catch up." The Synth concluded, lighting another cigarette.

"Yeah..." Naomi glanced over to the swampland, noticing that something moved in the distance. A mirelurk? It was big, whatever it was and clearly not interested in them as it slowly wandered through the dark.

 _I just hope that they can forgive me..._


	7. Chapter 7

Naomi approached the front door of the Listening Station, hand hovering over her revolver as she did so. It started off as a regular snub nose .44 but she eventually built her own based on Kellog's, the gun that was used to kill her husband. It was more for practical reasons than sentimental. She was crazy, even she could admit that at this point but not that crazy.

Her fingers lightly tapped the black grip of the firearm and eventually settled down as she reached the door and realising that there was no one on watch...

She slowly drew her gun, realising that just because nobody was on watch, that didn't mean that nobody was inside, waiting for them. Realising this, Naomi drew her weapon and held it up, backing against a wall.

"You ready for this Nick?" She asked as she watched him step against the opposite side of the front door, his bare metallic fingers were wrapped around the trigger of his pipe revolver.

"On your mark..." He uttered, trying to peer inside, without giving his position away or getting shot. Naomi nodded and quickly ducked under him and stepped inside, raising her handgun at the ransacked steel cage, which quickly scanned the room...

 _Nothing..._

"S'okay Nick... Nobody's here..." She said this quite loudly, in case anyone was there and they could be lulled into a false sense of security.

Nick sighed heavily and stepped inside, he was glad that they weren't shot on sight as that seemed to have been the Brotherhood's policy for the last eight months or so...

The Synth's eyes remained fixed on Naomi as she wandered over to the elevator's terminal, finding it difficult to get over how savage she looked. Her head had been shaved and formed into a Mohawk, her face was incredibly dirty and painted to make herself look like a raider.

What had happened over the past month... What had changed? She was so confident in the Institute and how it could move humanity forward into a better age. Hell, she almost had him believing her, given where her heart was. But now, she seemed to be so cold and distant in comparison... It was... Strange, to say the least...

Nick heard a heavy clunk coming from behind it, his back straightened as he spun around and took aim, expecting to come face to face with a power armoured guard. To his surprise, he found himself coming face to faceplate with a skull, mounted onto the head of an armless protectron, that just seemed to stare at him through its glowing red eye, that was forced through the eye socket.

It was incredibly unsettling, considering that the machine just stood there, staring at him...

"Erm... Hello?" Valentine asked, looking incredibly uneasy around it, the fact that it was just staring at him made him want to shoot its head off to make it stop.

The Robot simply beeped in response, taking a step forward but otherwise not doing anything threatening. It was then that Naomi picked up on it and looked back over her shoulder.

"Oh, Terry's here..." She said, giving the two machines a smile but not getting on back as she wandered over to greet her mechanical pack Brahmin.

"Terry?"

"Yeah... I build him to carry my stuff..." Naomi murmured, gesturing to the many bags strapped to his back and to his waist.

 _And to keep me company..._

"Heh... I thought that's what I was for." Nick murmured, giving her a smirk, though it wasn't returned as the elevator's bell struck and the door clattered open.

With a sigh, Naomi turned around and noticed that someone stumbled out of the elevator, hands tied behind their back, falling to their knees with a pained groan. Her eyes widened as she saw the hostage's face.

Naomi then glanced up and saw a man in a full suit of T-60 Power Armour, painted in Brotherhood Colours. Though she expected to see someone in this armour, she didn't expect it to be... him.

"Danse..."

"Good, you recognise me. That will save us some time." Danse said, rather harshly as he glanced to Naomi.

"I take it that you know why I'm doing this... Though, what I don't understand is what you are up to. The Envoy, you two, coming alone... Whatever your intentions are, I suggest that you get them out in the open now."

Naomi nodded and stepped forward, glancing down to Hancock, who doubled over and stared at the floor, wincing in pain.

"First of all, I would like to ask if my... friend is hurt."

Danse glanced down to the Ghoul, a mix of disgust and reluctance in his eye as he did so before he turned his gaze back to Naomi.

"I am afraid so, our interrogation got a little vocal and one of the greener recruits gut punched him."

"Little bastard cheap shot me!" Hancock growled, glancing back over to the Paladin.

"I'll be fine though, I can walk it off..."

Naomi rolled her eyes, resisting the urge to smile, she didn't exactly like to see Hancock in pain but the experience of being interrogated didn't seem to change him any, which was good. However, the urge was soon lost as she looked back up to Paladin Danse, who effortlessly reminded her of why all this was happening.

"Paladin Danse... I beseech you to cease all hostilities towards me and my people. I know that the Brotherhood and I haven't seen eye to eye in the past... In fact, I'd say that's putting it lightly. But enough people have died in this war and with all due respect, you are in no position to be at our throats.

I **want** to help you evacuate, if that's what you wish or even give you a place here. But to do that, I need your cooperation. I need you to promise that you or any of your brothers and sisters will not fire on me and my allies." Naomi insisted, she could feel her stomach grow hollow, her hands start to tremor...

 _Not now..._ She thought, pinning her hand to her hip.

Danse paused, narrowing his eyes at her before before sighing and nodding in agreement.

"I can agree to those terms, assuming that you and yours will do the same. The Brotherhood do not have the means to start another war at this point but know that if you betray this trust, I will personally see to it that I take as much as I can of yours away from you. That much you can be certain on as I have little left to lose."

The Sole Survivor nodded, reluctantly as Valentine joined her by her side, glancing over to her.

"Well, now that we're all friends again, we should probably think about what we want to do next in terms of the Brotherhood." The Synth began, looking over to Danse.

"What did you have in mind?"

Danse wouldn't normally address a Synth like one would a human but these were... strange times and he'd be blind and ignorant if he honestly believed that all Synths were the same...

"We have been in contact with our Comrades in the Capital Wasteland, they've dispatched a Hummer and are currently driving it along the Coast, hoping to reach us sometime soon. We were thinking of making an attempt to cross the boarders and leave the commonwealth. Although, under your protection, it might just be possible."

"I can get Preston to arrange a convoy of Minutemen to escort you out of the territory, I'd even be willing to join them." Naomi replied, hoping that she could definitely earn Danse's trust. In truth, she had nothing against Danse, the Brotherhood and its ideology did not agree with her, neither did their morality but she didn't have anything against the individuals who fought within it. They had good intentions, even if they didn't truly come into fruition...

"They can provide you some good cover as you make your way through the more... populated cities."

"So long as there is no more bloodshed, I am willing to comply." Danse sighed, veering off to the right.

"I... Was honestly expecting you to come down here and try to exterminate what was left of us. It would seem that me and my comrades were wrong about you."

"I'm not so sure about that." Naomi admitted, folding her arms and furrowing her brow.

"I think that it's just time that I learn from my mistakes..."

Danse nodded, leaving a silence in the air before speaking again for the last time...

"I think that's a lesson that we've both learned." He admitted as he turned back to the elevator and stepped inside, he turned his attention back to the woman who was formally his enemy... still was officially but she also happened to be his best chance of leaving this place.

"I'll get my people prepared, whilst you tend to your..." Danse paused, to swallow back the first word that came to mind.

"Man...

I'll report within the hour."

Naomi nodded, with a smile as Valentine began to work on Hancock's bindings...

"Take as much time as you need..."

Danse pushed the button and shut the elevator's door, allowing it to begin its descent and for Naomi's group to recuperate. By now, Naomi's mouth was incredibly dry and she could feel herself going hollow and shivery, though she did her best to suppress it.

"Urgh..." Hancock groaned as he rolled his shoulders and furiously shook his head.

"You okay?" His lover asked, whilst Valentine wandered off, over to the nearby door, keeping lookout and giving Romero and Juliet some private time.

Hancock seemed to shake it off quite quickly as promised, he just grinned and shrugged, rolling his shoulders back, like he was dusting himself off.

"Aye, nothin' that a bit of jet won't fix..." The Ghoul said dismissively, glancing back to the elevator.

"One of them had it in for me..."

"Don't worry, I'll protect you from those big, bad brotherhood boys." Naomi teased, poking his chest and getting a faint chuckle out of him.

"Hey, I would've had him, had you not told me to keep my hands to myself. Hell, the way that kid punched, I'm surprised that he didn't break his wrist."

Hancock's gaze quickly fell to the floor before he looked back up to his girl, his smile slowly faded as he saw her shaved head. He wasn't about to judge her for it, it looked good in it's own way but it just wasn't... her...

"Why the haircut?" He asked, brushing some dust off of his coat as if he was trying to be casual about the whole thing... he failed miserably.

"Oh? Ol' Hancock's getting judgemental in his old age..."

"Nah, ain't like that... Besides, how many women complain that their squeeze don't notice when they get their hair done? You should consider yourself lucky..."

"Yeah, I'm lucky that my boyfriend notices when I shave my head..." Naomi smirked, rolling her eyes.

"Oh c'mon... Can you blame me, there are so many other places that get my immediate attention, it's hard to notice the little things..."

"Oh, my hair's a 'little thing?'"

"Compared to what I usually look at, yeah..." Hancock smirked, getting her shake her head in shame.

She paused for a minute, wondering if she should answer the question seriously... it wasn't often that she talked about her feelings with Hancock... He was more of a fun guy to be around, rather than a confident. But he was still empathic and understanding...

"I... Didn't want anyone to recognise me, so I went for a look that wasn't me. Kind of like that spy for the Railroad..."

 _The one that I murdered..._

"I figured that if I changed my hair and clothes, then people would stay away or not recognise me. Unfortunately it worked..."

"Why unfortunately?" Hancock asked, narrowing his eyes and furrowing his brow.

"Because I ran away, didn't I? I fucked up and chose to run away instead of facing my problems head on and now I'm being dragged back into the fold and in truth? I wouldn't have if you two hadn't found me..."

"Naomi..." Hancock sighed, cutting her off. He'd heard enough of her feeling sorry for herself, it **really** didn't suit her.

"I've done **exactly** what you've done dozens of times and every time I come back a better man. Sometimes we need to step back and look at the bigger picture, you might've fucked up but somewhere on the big map of the commonwealth, there's a farmer who's elbow deep in brahmin shit, who was a shivering wreck on the streets of diamond city, this time last year.

You gave people the one thing that they need, a chance and the means to build a better life for themselves. Forget savin' lives and shit, you gave people the tools to build their own lives on their own terms. Far as I'm concerned, nothin' else matters..."

The Soul Survivor sighed, she appreciated it, she really did but... he didn't understand. He didn't know what she knew and it tore her apart that she couldn't share it with anyone but Terry and that was only because he couldn't speak... It was like talking to herself.

She didn't have any shame in admitting that she was crazy...

"Thanks Hancock..." She uttered, stepping forward and embracing him, closing her eyes and resting her forehead against his scabby chest. The stench of decay was difficult to ignore but it was worth it... Just to be held like that again...

 _At least now I'll be able to put something right..._


	8. Chapter 8

Naomi stepped outside of the bunker, letting the light bleed inside. She had dressed up in a Harness, that Terry was carrying in one of his many bags and wearing a Skull mouth bandanna. She often went for the Gunner look, not because she had any semblance of respect for them but because it said 'don't fuck with me.'

Raiders sometimes gave that look off but most people just shot at raiders on sight, Gunners... usually got shot at a little less. She slowly raised her pipboy up to her face as she proceeded to flick through the menus, there she found an old Holotape, buried deep in her archives.

She wished that they could be shuffled or something, so that this tape was nearer to the top, she'd been listening to it every day for... Three months now.

She sighed heavily and took a seat on a rock in front of the Listening post, hitting the play button and lifting up her head, staring out onto the horizon...

There was a bit of feedback at the beginning of the tape, it always made her chuckle, given how clumsy her late husband could be with these things...

" _Oopsie. Ha ha ha. No, no, no. Little fingers away. There we go. Just say it. Right there. Right there. Go ahead."_

She heard Shaun's laugh, how she missed it... Somehow those memories weren't tainted from her experiences in the Institute. She still pictured Shaun... Her Shaun as the baby that was taken by Kellogg. That was the last time she ever saw her Shaun... The others were just... Artificial constructs that existed only to torment her.

" _Ha ha! Yay! Hi honey! Listen..._

 _I don't think Shaun and I need to tell you how great of a mother you are. But, we're going to anyway. You are kind, and loving, and funny, that's right, and patient. So patient, patience of a saint as your mother used to say."_

She began to sigh, resting her head against the monitor of her wrist computer. How long ago was this? Two years... To her at least. She wondered if she posessed any of these qualities anymore, she'd done so much to those who threatened her. She abandoned her boyfriend, all of her friends, her people...

And what she did to the Institute was... Could that be called kindness or love? She didn't have the patience to guide them, if she did, she wouldn't be out here... __

 _"Look, with Shaun and us all being home together it's been an amazing year but even so I know our best days are yet to come. There will be changes sure, things we'll need to adjust to. I'll rejoin the civilian workforce, you'll shake the dust off your law degree._

 _But everything we do no matter how hard, we do it for our family._

 _Now say goodbye Shaun. Bye bye, say bye bye._

 _Bye honey, we love you."_

"We do it for our family..." She murmured, resting her chin on her knee, burying her chapped lips into the side of the device.

 _Back when we had a family..._

She slowly looked up to the sky, eyes tear-blinded as she did so. It didn't feel like the same sky anymore, it was but... it wasn't. Maybe that was the problem... She hadn't been Naomi Eastwood since that day that she was put on Ice, she was frozen and the ice didn't seem to thaw off of her heart. This world had changed her, she hadn't been herself since she fell out of that pod.

How was it fair that her world was destroyed? That Vault Tech took her thousand Dollars and just... died? They froze her, killed her friends and family and gave the Institute her baby. Where was the justice for her? Or those who the Institute has wronged?

Perhaps it wasn't the evil that caused these problems... It was the gullibility of the kind. Perhaps Patience wasn't a virtue that worked out here, it just risked getting you killed.

Well, unless you were as good with a high powered rifle as she was...

"Erm... Danse is ready to go, Naomi, just say the word." Nick said, clearly he had been stood there for a while but it wasn't certain what he had seen.

"Thanks Nick..." Naomi sighed, blinking repeatedly to suppress whatever tears lingered in her eyes before she rose to her feet, glancing back over to him. Her eyes were hidden behind the black paint that had been smeared around them, also alluding to Naomi's cover.

Her face was heavily scarred, a few close calls with enemy bullets and blades had left their mark on it. Not that it mattered, out here that was quite a benefit, looking somewhat scary and the scars looked quite faint in light or in the dark, it was just in the dim middle ground that they were noticeable.

"We'll get moving now, whilst there's light in the sky."

"Alright..." Nick paused, obviously he was hesitant to confront her on what he had just witnessed.

"Is there... anything you'd like to talk about...?"

"No, not now at least. We should focus on getting the Brotherhood to their extraction point. Maybe then I can... Talk, okay?"

Nick nodded, that seemed fair enough, hell she was more than welcome to tell him to keep his nose out of her business.

Naomi just glanced to the floor, deciding that their business was concluded before she slowly looked away, blankly staring out onto the horizon. She had a bit of time to prepare herself for battle...

It was odd, for the first time in months, she didn't feel like drawing her gun or having her machete at the ready. For the first time in months, she just wanted to rest...

Both Naomi and Danse walked at the front of the group as they lead the Brotherhood remnants down south. Minutement walked by their side, to ensure that there weren't any hostilities with the locals.

There was a lot of bad blood with the Brotherhood, given that twelve months ago Naomi was at war with them. Sure, they feared the institute but at least they knew that Naomi was on their side somewhat, the Brotherhood of Steel were somehow a rogue element, a terrible reminder of how things used to be...

Naomi glanced over to the Brotherhood Scribe entrusted with the child. Her gaze softened as she caught it in her field of view, looking a little saddened. That child was a lot like her own, in so many ways. Orphaned through a conflict that it had nothing to do with. A year ago, she wanted to kill the man who stole her baby away from her, seven months ago she did... But now? She wondered if she had become Kellog, which was somewhat ironic, considering that the closest to becoming Kellog was Nick, who once spoke in his voice.

She always wondered if the old fucker lay dormant inside his head or if those were his last words...

"That Child is surprisingly easy to manage." Paladin Danse commented, getting Naomi to turn back to him, with a raised eyebrow.

"Hah... At that age they usually are. Well, not exactly easy but they're easier to satisfy than children are." The former Mother said, giving the Paladin a smile, it was almost as if she'd forgotten that they were enemies.

"You sound like you have experience..." Danse replied, glancing back to her.

"We weren't fortunate to have anyone in our group who had children, so we had to improvise."

Naomi couldn't help but chuckle at that idea, a bunch of power armoured warriors trying to use a bottle of talcon powder, without accidentally getting their suits covered in the white, snowy powder.

"I'm pretty sure that a television network could've made millions off of that premise." She smirked, getting an odd look at him.

"You mean those transmitting stations before the war? Like... radio with a picture?" Danse asked, curiously.

"We set up base along the way in one but it didn't provide much by way of tech. We got a few transmitter parts and some sensitive components. Frankly, I think that we would've been better moving on and missing it but at least our people got to rest."

"Well, back in the day, the used to emit dozens of signals going out across Boston. Hundreds of stories, being told to thousands of ears, just waiting to be heard. You had a magic box that could show you what was happening in the world, with live footage showing you what was happening. There were sporting events like Baseball, Football and Soccer. Dramas, comedies... Things that taught you to look at the world anew or just things that you could stop to watch with your family.

As... You can tell, I miss it sometimes."

Paladin Danse looked down to her, just as wistful as she was about the whole thing.

"It sounds wonderful, though terrifying as well... One of many distractions that the old world had to offer. At least you can work with a radio on in the background...

I read the Dossier entries about you, how you were... Frozen. When we first met, you mentoined something about it, I think. Coming from a Vault?"

"Mmhmm... Imagine that, surviving Nuclear Annihilation, only to freeze to death..." The Sole Survivor sighed, shaking her head.

"May I ask what it was like? The War...?"

Naomi paused, falling silent before sighing, she then shrugged it off as best she could.

"It came from nowhere... Sirens blared out, people were running through the streets, panicking over the stupidest of things. Everyone was trying to get into the vault, just out of sheer desperation, knowing that they would just get turned away.

I don't know what's worse, being left behind or knowing that you were the only one who was entitled to live. Either way, I walked past my neighbours, left them behind, so many people just... wiped out in the blink of an eye.

It happened whilst we were being lowered into the vault... there was a flash, then dust, then heat and this huge mushroom cloud grew on the horizon as everything shook. It was like the earth itself was pissed at us. My eyes were fixed on Shaun, Nate's were... His were just stuck to the fires on the horizon..."

"I'm... Sorry, I know that this might be taxing for you but... Was Nate your husband?"

"Yes..." Naomi sighed, glancing to the floor and shaking her head before looking up, they seemed to be coming up to a military checkpoint of some sorts. If Naomi remembered correctly, it was the one nearest to Jamaica Planes, perhaps they could rest there tonight...

"You don't... Have to pretend to give a shit, I know that I'm the enemy Danse... I guess it's some sort of reckoning."

"I never fake empathy, you should know that by now." Danse reminded her as if her levelling with him only angered him, which wasn't far from the truth.

"You lost everything in the blink of an eye, it went up in flames and all that you were able to do was pick up the pieces. If anything it will make you understand exactly what you put us through."

Naomi sighed, it sounded like it was going so well... Shame that he had to spoil it by trying to guilt trip her.

It wasn't like anyone on that ship could be called 'innocent,' it needed to be destroyed, if she hadn't already she would have made it her priority right now. Still, the Sole Survivor pressed on, knowing that it wasn't really worth bringing up, especially if she wanted to see the back of these assholes sooner rather than later.

The group slowly approached the Military Checkpoint, Naomi had no intentions of stopping, they wouldn't need to for hours yet and Jamaica Plains wasn't that far off. It was much better accommodated to holding them, given that it was an actual settlement.

Naomi heard thunder, just above her, accompanied by a flash of light, a radiation storm wouldn't hurt any of the Power Armoured Brotherhood Members but the baby was unlikely to have a strong resistance to it.

"C'mon, we need to find somewhere with four walls and a roof!" Naomi insisted, looking over to the Military Checkpoint. She remembered passing through this area a few weeks ago, where some Gunners had decided to use it as a temporary base. She just hoped that they hadn't come back to reclaim it...

Naomi lifted her rifle and quickly raised her hand to tell the others to stop, Hancock and Nick would be able to make sure that nobody reached the Maxson child. Both Naomi and Paladin Danse wandered over to the front door, doing their best not to alert anyone to their presence. The rest stayed behind as the Baby began to stir, growing restless from being carried about so much.

"Look at that, the little guy's almost as bored as I am." Hancock smirked, giving the baby a small wave, wiggling his rotten fingers. This obviously disgusted the baby's carer, who rolled her eyes.

"Turn away, Ghoul, your face is likely to scar that baby for life! You look like a corpse for God's sake!

We've done our best to protect this child from the horrors of the outside world, if you had any shred of decency in you you'd stay away."

"Then why haven't you assholes put bags over your heads? If you had any decency, you'd be talking to me through a sack." Hancock shrugged, he kind of expected this from the Brotherhood. Hypocritical, shit kicking, boy scouts.

"Zombie."

"Funny, last time I checked, only one of us lives underground..."

Naomi pushed herself against the wall, next to the entrance, looking up to Danse as he stepped on over to it and harshly kicked it open with the boot of his power armour.

He slowly marched inside as Naomi ran after him, checking her corners by placing her sites on them. Within minutes they found that they were seemingly alone...

"Alright..." Danse called back, looking over his shoulder at the others.

"It's all clea-"

Danse was cut off as he saw one of the Greener Brotherhood Soldiers fall, he was quite literally sliced in half, with his legs keeling over and his upper body just landing on a heap on the ground. Another soldier was quickly impaled on something, with a deep stomach wound shoved into his chest, that managed to lift him up and throw him away.

It was then that a hail of blue lasers came down from the sky, hitting the baby's carer and sending her staggering backwards. She frantically looked to Hancock, something... fearful in her eye as she slowly turned blue, shivering furious.

"T-Take..." She mouthed as she began burning up and disolving into ash.

Hancock quickly threw his shotgun to the ground and put out his hands, the baby fell into them as its carer no longer had a physical form and couldn't hold him as she quickly turned into a small ash pile. Hancock wrapped the baby up in his coat, running to the nearest bit of cover, which happened to be the wall.

It was stupid to press himself against the wall, like this. This wasn't exactly the best place to be but the large delivery truck in front of him wasn't an option, since he wouldn't be able to run around it time.

Hancock looked inside his coat, to see that the child was unharmed, he gave him a quick glance over to make sure that he wasn't injured in any way before turning his attention back to the battlefield. He immediately looked up, where he saw a skeletal, gen one synth, taking aim him. He quickly reached round his back, drawing his combat knife from it and quickly tossing it upwards at the robot. The knife didn't seem to be as effective to robots as it was to humans as it simply hit the machine and pretty much bounced right off of it.

However, not long after, a gunshot echoed across the way and the Synth's head exploded, its body went flying onto the roof as it was instantly reduced to scrap metal by the shot of a high calibur bullet.

"Hancock, I've got you covered!" Nick called out, taking another shot at the synths on the roof. This prompted Nick to run over to the former police officer, baby swaddled in the coat of fourth President of the Continental Congress. He wondered if this was what the real John Hancock would have in mind, the first time he saw this coat...

Probably not, unless he was taking as many chems as his spiritual descendant would. Hancock continued to sprint towards Nick, doing his best to keep his head down as he did so. Though it was a short run, it felt like an eternity, an almost endless boulevard of death as he constantly found himself kicking through burned ashes and jumping over corpses.

He quickly looked up, to see that the gap between him and Valentine was closing dramatically as he kept up the sprint, he could feel a sense of relief as he drew closer to the Synth, ready to finally ready to pass him this infant before it spat up on him or something...

Due to his desperation, he didn't see the faint shimmers to his right as they quickly materialised into a tall man in a black coat, eyes hidden behind equally black shades with a shaved head. He was able to tackle the Ghoul to the ground with little difficulty, due to the fact that he was exceptionally strong and he had the advantage of surprise.

Hancock fell to the ground, skidding along the floor with the Courser on top of him, who swiftly lifted a familiar looking combat knife and drove it down towards the Ghoul's chest...

"You treacherous bitch..." Danse muttered, slowly lifting his laser rifle and pointing it directly at the would be traitor, finger carefully placed on the trigger as he held her in his sites.

"You **knew** we were desperate and you lead us out here to be slaughtered!"

"D-Danse..." Naomi stammered, finding it difficult to figure out what was even going on. This couldn't be happening...

"Danse, I swear, this has _nothing_ to do with me! I haven't said a word to the Institute, because I didn't want this! I don't know how they know about it but I swear, it _wasn't_ me!"

"I'm not trusting any of your lies! You've betrayed us twice now, I may die here but at least my death will ensure that your treachery will die here, with me!"

"Danse, stop, think for a second, we need to-"

Danse didn't have time for any more lies, he quickly raised his rifle, within the blink of an eye Naomi's head was in his sites. He pulled the trigger, aiming to put an end to the woman who brought the Brotherhood to ruin...


	9. Chapter 9

Naomi gasped as the laser hit her shoulder. That rifle had one hell of a kick to it.

Thankfully, she was armoured enough to be resilient to the shot, she stumbled back and quickly raised her .44 magnum at the Paladin, swiftly pulling the trigger and sending one hell of a punch into his power armoured chest.

Both Hancock and Nick were now pressed against the truck, weapons at the ready. A few more synths remained, scattered around the area. Though it would seem that they were latecomers, who had beamed in at the last minute.

Dozens of Gen 1 synths lay scattered around the outpost as well as the corpses of fallen Brotherhood members.

"Where's Naomi?" The Ghoul asked, frantically as he looked around.

"She ran inside the base with Danse, the implications don't look good for her." Valentine pointed out, furrowing his brow.

"Or us..." Hancock added, seeing the outpost light up red and yellow, flashing several times as both Naomi and Danse continued to shoot at eachother.

Hancock broke cover and sprinted on over to the bunker's front door, pressing himself up against it.

"Hancock!" Nick called out, running over to the Ghoul, just as he stepped in.

"Hey, Danse!" Hancock growled, making sure that the child was clearly visible.

"You sure you want to do this right now!?"

Dance glanced over to the ghoul, dismissively at first but as he saw the child his eyes began to widen.

"The Child!" He snapped, raising his rifle.

"No!" Naomi screeched, raising her own weapon in retaliation, straight at Danse's head.

"You want this to work out for you? Then let me make something clear.

You don't touch John! Harm him in any way and you'll never see that baby again!"

Danse paused, looking over to the child as he lowered his weapon.

"Understood..." He said, begrudgingly.

"Give me the baby and I'll let you leave here with your lives."

"Pfft... Might want to the math, a-hole. There's three of us and only one of you." Hancock pointed out, raising his own .44.

"Your numbers don't scare me, freak!" Danse said, sternly.

"Maybe not but it's a long walk out of here, 'specially when you have a crying baby in your arms and the Institute tailing you." Nick pointed out as he was the only one not pointing a gun at Danse right now.

"You **are** the Institute!" Danse pointed out, gesturing to the ground.

"You called these machines to wipe us out!"

"Open your damn eyes Danse! They attacked us, just as much as they attacked you.

Why would we destroy our own re-enforcements? It doesn't make any strategic sense.

I know that you hate me.

I know that this is my fault but the Institute is working against me, just as it is you. We **need** to get our s-t together and get back across the boarder."

Danse paused nodding with a sigh. He hated it when the enemy was right.

"Very well; we move out, now." He instructed, marching over to Hancock and extending his arms.

"Give me the child."

"Sorry." hancock said, shaking his head.

"Think I'll keep hold of her for now."

Danse's eyes narrowed as Naomi approached from behind.

"He'll be safe with John. It'll be okay, Danse, I trust John with my life.

I want this kid to make it... maybe more than you do."

"Why!?" Danse asked, shifting and turning back to face her.

"What could you possibly get out of this!?"

Naomi paused, glancing away before sighing heavily.

"If I pull this off?" She said, taking a step towards the door and looking down to the Maxson child.

"I'll be able to live with myself..."

The group continued to walk down the wrecked highway. They looked an odd site. A mad, raider-looking woman. A ghoul in an eighteenth century coat. An old Synth in a battered old Trench Coat and hat and a Paladin, armoured up to the point that he'd give a super mutant a run for his money. All of them were carrying a baby, like a children's movie, where a group of ferocious animals would work together to bring a child home.

The group arrived at Jamaica planes, a bustling little town that centered around a church. The town's boundaries used to be a lot smaller, until Hancock got here and made it his own little project.

He was still on sabbatical, not ready to call himself 'mayor' just yet. Still, he was happy to serve as an adviser of sorts, the woman in charge or the woman who used to be in charge, was grateful for his help.

Even if his methods could be a little unorthodox...

The town had expanded to the point that they had taken the church. The problem lay with the people, there just weren't enough of them to hold any more territory. They were stretched thin as it was. He had hoped that Naomi would send a few robots his way but, due to her going off the deep end, she hadn't been building any.

The group approached the church, currently the safest place in Jamaica planes. The people there usually shot the Brotherhood on sight, however, given that this particular Paladin was traveling with a friendly group, which contained both Hancock and the town's founder, they chose not to ask any questions.

Danse looked around, noticing that the watch woman's eyes narrowed above her stars and stripes balaclava. Danse returned her glare, more suspicious than angry.

"Lot of bad blood between your people and mine." Hancock explained, taking his first step up to the church.

"I get it, you told them we were a danger to them. We're enemies on the battlefield, it's hardly expected."

Though Hancock shook his head as he opened the church's front door and stepped inside, his voice echoed throughout the steeple as he spoke.

"Didn't tell 'em sh-t Danse. Your people did, when a vertibird attacked the town."

"Then you acted accordingly, with our own forces scattered, a lot of us have to think for ourselves. Sometimes rules are forgotten or misinterpreted but I can say the the Brotherhood, our chapter, does not condone firing on civilians.

"Pfft, you people ain't exactly above steppin' on people to get your own way."

"We do what we must, our work is about the future of mankind. We cannot afford to hesitate."

"Oh, so these folks got shot at for their own good?" Hancock scoffed before spitting across the room.

"You honestly believe that? Then you're no better than the Institute."

"Hey, Valentine." Naomi interrupted as the Snth scrawled into a case file. The gumshoe quickly looked up, making eye contact with his friend.

"Go on." he paused as he looked up, seeing the child in Naomi's arms.

"Think... You can take him for a bit?" I... I'd rather not..."

Valentine quickly realized what the issue was, he gently took the infant into his own, metallic, arms and let Naomi turn away, trying not to watch as she furiously rubbed at her eyes.

"S-Sorry... She sniffed, turning back to him.

I.. Though I would be past this by now."

"It's understandable, this is the first baby you've seen since Shaun... Pretty sure that it brought back a lot of bad memories."

Naomi shook her head, sighing heavily.

"It's not the bad memories, it's the good ones...

Bad ones haunt me all the time. The good ones just remind me of what I lost, y'know?"

"That what this is about?" Valentine asked, clearly concerned.

"No... Maybe, I don't know, head, it's a f-ing mess right now. It's like my head and my hearts are divorced and they're constantly yelling at eachother as I get more and more frustrated, just listening to them.

I just... I don't know anymore, Nick. Out there, I've stopped being afraid. Afraid of getting myself killed.

I'm not saying that I want to kill myself but...

If I saw the end, coming right towards me? I wouldn't even flinch at this point."

"Hmm... You mentioned an inner conflict... Any way to resolve it? Appease both your head and heart...?"

Naomi paused, glancing down to the baby with a heavy sigh.

"I don't know. I was wrong... helping the Institute. I... see that now..."

"I can't arguewith that but at least thingsare stable now. You would think that, brought the conflict to an end.

If I was you, I'd try and make sure that the Institute gets taken down a peg or two. Maybe with the Minutemen and communities that you've built up over the past year?

"Maybe... But.. I'm not even sure if we could do that at this point."

"Naomi, in the time that I've known you, you've made the area around Sanctuary the place where raiders go to die. You've brought the Minutemen back from the dead and almost single handeldy wiped out the Brotherhood ofSteel.

Frankly, I think that the Institute should be afraid."

"heh, the way you put it, I almost don' sound like a complete and utter f-up..." Naomi said, smirking softly, almost sounding amused.

"Guess I'm a better word smith than I give myself credit for." Nick said, giving her a faint smile.

"C'mon, get some rest. The three of you will need it." Naomi nodded, sighing heavily turning back and heading towards the door.

"You think it'll work out tomorrow?" She asked, coming to a stop.

"Hey..." The Prototype Synth chuckled, faintly.

"When does it ever?"


	10. Chapter 10

The sun slowly rose above Jamaica Planes, casting it's faint light over the town. The people, huddled together in their houses and sleeping on the door steps didn't seem to react too much to it, most of them were used to just turning the other way and blocking the sunlight for another hour or two.

Naomi, on the other hand, found that her eyes shot open upon coming into contact with the sun's light. She furrowed her brow and scanned the horizon before closing her eyes again to rest them. They burned at the moment as a lack of sleep was starting to take its toll.

She sighed heavily as she slowly rose to her feet and wandered over to the edge of the building, looking out through, what used to be, a window. She folded her arms and stared out, blankly, feeling the lure of the wilderness calling her.

Why was she even here?

Less than a week ago she was hacking and slashing her way through that swamp, she was clearing her head, finding herself. She wondered why she was always pulled back into the fight, always being thrown into battles that she didn't pick.

The Sole Survivor took a step forward and hopped down onto the street below. She wondered if Terry was holding up okay as she began to patrol the streets, the armless robot was carrying quite a bit of equipment after all and though it wasn't exactly irreplaceable, she didn't want to lose it.

It was funny really, how Terry was her only companion out here. A Protectron without arms and a skull for a face, who's only means of self preservation was to headbutt his attackers and of course, he couldn't do anything if he was pushed over. One time he fell down an elevator shaft, which was a joy to try and retrieve him as he plummeted around 50ft down to the center of some basement.

She began to appreciate not having human company, it was a shame that that time seemed to be ending though...

She slowly looked up onto the horizon again, sighing wistfully as she did so, only to notice something moving towards her. It looked like a skeleton... Carrying a rather large and blocky weapon. Naomi's brow furrowed until she saw what it was, causing her eyes to widen before she raised her gun and shot off at it, blowing one of its arms off and more importantly waking everyone up in the town.

Hancock's black, featureless eyes shot open as he gasped and sat up. He was one of many who did so but was the first to react, snatching Omar and jumping to his feet. He sprinted out into the hallway, shotgun ready to fire in case the enemy had already infiltrated the building.

Nick was already gone, made sense, seeing that he would have already been awake. Hancock glanced around to make sure that no enemies were about before another shot rang out in the town, prompting him to make a dash for his right and run out into the street.

He saw an army of twenty, thirty maybe, skeletal synths running over the hillside. It would seem that the Institute were getting somewhat desperate, though it wasn't certain if they were the advanced guard or the full force of the assault.

"Naomi!" Hancock yelled, drawing his heavily modified .44 magnum from his coat and blasting it at one of the synths.

"Get Danse and the kid out of here! I've got this!"

Naomi flinched as a bullet whizzed past her head, just as she turned to face her ghoulish lover. The bullet took a Gen 1 synth's head clean off, though Naomi barely reacted to it.

"What!? What about you!?"

"I'll be the one having all of the fun!" Hancock called back, blasting at the nearest Synth and sending the top half of its head flying off as some gen 2s began to teleport on the horizon.

"Hancock, there's too many for you to take on alone!"

"Agreed..." Nick said, taking out the last of the skeletal gen 1s.

"So I'll stay with him. You and Danse need to get that baby out of here!"

Naomi's heart sank as she could feel her gut get filleted by her own fear, she glanced over to Paladin Danse, who was tearing up dozens of Synths with a fallen comrade's minigun.

She then turned back to her lover and close friend, feeling like this was the ultimate in life and death situations... The Child or her lover? The man she wronged or the man who saved her?

She couldn't lose another one, not after Nate. She just couldn't...

"Naomi, move!" Hancock growled as a synth's torso went flying through the air, landing in a heap on the floor.

The Sole Survivor eventually nodded and turned back to Danse, slapping his power armored arm.

"We need to move!" She called before running inside to get the child, she found herself instantly drawn to his screams and cries as the gunfire had woken him up.

She leapt up the stairs, taking them two at a time in her stride as she made her way to the top. Upon reaching the top step and sprinted to the mail box that they were keeping the child in, scooping him up in her arms.

"C'mon little guy, we've gotta go!"

Hancock saw more gen 2s beam in on the horizon, prompting him to snap Omar's barrel down as he reached into the pocket of his ancient coat and picked the bullets out. Sadly, he came up shot.

"Well... Damn..." He muttered, snapping Omar shut again and drawing his .44.

"I thought I had more shells..."

"We always think we have more shells..." Nick said, profoundly as he glanced over to the ghoul.

"Do you need my .44 rounds? I've got a lot of .38..."

"Pfft... .38? Might as well throw tangerines at them or somethin'..." Hancock smirked before shaking his head, spinning the feed mechanism of his revolver and stopping it with his hand.

"Nah, tangerines would have a chance of hurting someone..." Valentine pointed out, raising his own.44 magnum.

"Think our chances are good?" The Ghoul asked, watching as the gen 2s approached.

"Course..." Nick shrugged, pulling the hammer back.

"I'd be running otherwise..."

Naomi ran down the stairway and stepped back out, clutching her combat rifle as she leaned out of the front door and peered around before stepping out, rifle raised at the ready as Danse stepped out with the baby in his arms.

"Okay, we need to move!" She called as the Jamaica Planes Militia ran past, armed and armoured to the teeth as they got ready to take on the synth horde.

John, the guard who watched the street into town stepped in behind Hancock, drawing his revolver that used to be Kellog's. He fired off a few shots as several other soldiers stepped in behind him and began to fire off into the horde of synths sprinting towards them.

"The old folk in the church?" Hancock asked as someone handed him some shotgun shells, which he swiftly stuffed into his pockets.

"Yeah, got Leguizamo on watch."

"Oh... Well, better him being there than out here I guess..." Hancock sighed before taking another shot into the crowd as a woman in a minuteman coat and a musket rifle began to fire off into the crowd.

"We're taking a stand here! I'm getting sandbags deployed and I'm setting up traps in the event that we end up with coursers dropping in."

"Good, we got any heavy weapons?"

"Yessir!" A voice called out as a woman buried in heavy combat armour, face obscured by a stars and stripes banner stepped in beside the ghoul and began to spool her minigun.

The Minigun fired off and sprayed a tidal-wave of bullets at the incoming synths, tearing them limb from limb as they continued their assault. A few blue lasers were fired off of the horizon, though few were in danger of hitting anyone just yet.

"Turrets are online and the perimeter is covered! Going to be a close call but we should be okay!"

"We should be..." Hancock sighed as more lightning strikes could be seen on the horizon, however, unlike before they conjured black gowned figures, that quickly disappeared.

"But we won't..."

Naomi continued to sprint away from the battlefield as both her and Danse continued south, they just had to get to Quincy in order to escape the synths. Any synths following them would likely be fired up on by the Gunners and the huge firefight would make a great shroud.

Danse said nothing as he looked around, in truth he was quite impressed by the response to the Synth attack, the civilians seemed to be ready for anything. They were well defended and well lead, he had a little more faith in them than he did before but that wasn't really saying much...

"I can see the gate up ahead, we're almost in Gunner territory!" Naomi informed him as she looked over her shoulder, looking back to see the bombed out town before them. Bringing a baby into Quincy seemed like #1 in the big book of things that you should never do but times were desperate and at least gunners were easier to deal with than coursers.

With a loud clap of thunder and a flash, the ground was quickly hit by lightning, spawning several coursers who appeared before Naomi's eyes. She furrowed her brow as she saw them, raising her rifle as the ring of black coated men appeared before them, weapons quickly drawn and pointing at the child.

"Mother..." The middle courser began, lowering his weapon as he spoke.

"You must surrender the infant."

"To hell with you! I'm not letting you kill a baby, you souless rust bucket!"

"Please... Be reasonable. That child is a threat to the Institute's occupation of the Commonwealth, as are you as is M7-97. We can afford to spare you but the child and rogue element must be destroyed."

"What's M7-97!?" Danse snapped, stepping forward and getting several weapons locked onto his head.

"Hancock..." Naomi said, turning back to the Coursers.

"Right?"

"John McDonagh is a target but his life may be spared... M7-97 is a rogue unit and must be terminated as must the Maxson child."

"Wait... A rogue synth!?" Naomi asked, narrowing her eyes.

"Who... Who's M7-97!?"

Was it Nick? Possibly... though why hunt him **now** of all times?

"M7-97, override Alpha Charlie Tango, clearance level 9." The Courser said, getting a confused look from Naomi as she slowly turned back to Danse, the Synth stared off into space, seemingly in some sort of trance, like he was in standby mode...

Awaiting orders...

"Danse..." Naomi whispered, sympathetically.

"M7-97." The Courser stated, getting Naomi to look back over to him as he was one step closer to her.

"Terminate the Maxson child..."

Naomi's eyes widened as she felt her stomach hollow, she looked back to the Synthetic Paladin, who wrapped his giant metallic hand around the child's head, tightening his grip as it began to cry.

"No!"


	11. Chapter 11

Danse's grip slowly tightened around the child's head, it would have been like squeezing a rather large spot for him, especially in power armour. Naomi quickly raised her rifle, though she wasn't exactly sure what to do with it.

She'd have to kill Danse… That's what Danse would want, right? He'd rather die than betray his cause and it was the only way to save the child. Naomi wrapped her finger around the trigger and took a deep breath before a shot rang out across the dilapidated town…

Paladin Danse's back was winged by a Gunner's bullet, that caused him to stumble forward as it knocked him off balance. Naomi quickly lunged forward and hit Danse across the face with the butt of her gun, throwing it to one side as she snatched the Maxson child from his gasp. She ducked down as more Gunner snipers open fired on the Institute Synths, hitting one of the Coursers straight through the eye, killing them instantly.

Naomi continued to sprint towards the town's front gate, throwing herself into it and repeatedly pushing it open, the cries of the infant in her arms were all but drawn out by the gunfire that rained down over her head, like a meteor shower.

Naomi ran into the streets, where dozens of gunners were now running out, investigating the gunfire. Naomi panted and gasped as she ducked down again and made a bee line for the nearest alleyway.

"Hey, stop that bitch!" One of the Gunners yelled before a blue laser flew right past him, prompting him to raise his own gun and returned fire. Naomi didn't see the outcome of the firefight, nor did she give a shit. The best case scenario would be if both sides wiped eachother out but sadly fate wasn't that kind…

She continued to sprint towards the church as a mini nuke screeched over her head, tearing through the air as it flew off of the viaduct and crashed into the gate, blowing the doors off of their hinges and taking out a dozen or so common synths.

How the hell were there so many coursers? They were rare before and Naomi had taken out a dozen. It didn't seem possible, not with the Institute being the way that it was now…

Naomi continued to sprint across to the church, she was incredibly close to the Peabody residence. If she could just reach it, she'd be able to take a breather. Well, she hoped anyway…

A power armoured gunner stepped out of the church, immediately catching her eye as he did so. He turned to her, bearing a sly grin as he lifted his laser rifle and fired at her from the hip. Naomi yelled as it zapped her leg, thankfully just grazing it but it still managed to singe the flesh on it, causing her to stumble to the side and fall onto her hip. She grimaced, ignoring the baby's cries as she reached down for her thigh and tried to touch it, gasping once more as she felt pain shoot through her body.

"Argh…F-Fuck!" She winced, reaching for a stimpak, however, she heard the heavy footsteps of the gunner as he approached her, gun pointed at the ready.

"Call off your boys and I'll let you live." He said, cocking his jaw as if he was chewing something, possibly gum or chewing tobacco.

Naomi just scowled as she drew her stimpak but the Gunner quickly lifted his gun and shook his head, insisting that she lowered it back down to the ground.

"Uh uh honey… You **really** don't wanna do that…"

"You ignorant shit, they aren't with me! They're after me! After this baby…"

"Wait…" The Gunner said, chewing some more.

"You tellin' me that if I give them that little brat they'll fuck off?"

"After killing you, yeah…" Naomi sighed, Gunners always did think they could worm their way out of anything.

"They don't like loose ends."

"Well, either way, giving them you and the baby could make a distraction… You should stand up." He said before chewing some more, though he as wearing authority shades it was obvious that there wasn't an ounce of care in his eyes. Which was fine by Noami as the feeling was definitely neutral.

"Let me go and they'll come after me… They won't have time to kill you and they'll just have to come after me. Really, who would you rather bargain with? Me or a machine that's intent on killing anything that gets in its way? Just let me go and I take my problems with me…" Naomi said, she had a certain tone when trying to be diplomatic, perhaps it was a tone picked up in law school or maybe she was just a born diplomat…

The Gunner paused and looked away, eventually nodding.

"Right, fuck off. You stop running and I shoot you." He informed her, getting an appreciative nod as she jammed the stimpak in her leg and tossed its empty case to the ground. She turned back and began to hobble away, picking up the pace more and more as the stimpak did its work on her wound.

"Oh shit!" The Gunner yelled, turning back and open firing. Naomi couldn't see what he was shooting at, mind you, she didn't care either. She hoped that guy got fucking pasted, just so long as she was out of range when he did.

She heard the tell tale bleep of damaged power armour as she broke out into a sprint. The man repeatedly yelled out expletives in sheer terror as the bleeping grew more rapid. She heard the decompression of the suit as it opened, however, she knew that it was too late for him.

She would've liked it if he had lasted just a little bit longer…

There was a loud boom, that was like a second mini nuke detonating behind her, creating a large flash. She felt the heat on her back as she staggered forward, her ears rang, hollowing the screams of baby Maxson as she stumbled away from the warzone.

By now she was incredibly fatigued as she had been sprinting since the main gate, she just had to push just a little bit more, just until she reached the Peabody residence…

She looked up and realised that she was about to cross the boarder out of Quincy, it wasn't an official one but if you got to here, you'd probably be safe. She gave a relieved sigh before continuing onwards, seeing the imaginary boundary growing closer and closer.

It was then that it hit her, literally, a horrendous burning sensation scorched her hip, much like the one from before that had shot her in the leg. The surge of pain shot its way through Naomi's Torso as she lost her footing, spinning 90 degrees to her left as she and the baby went flying.

Naomi landed on her front, hitting the ground hard as she rolled over half a dozen times before finally coming to a stop. She had lost consciousness by the time she had and worst of all the child had stopped crying.

The Sole Survivor breathed a pained sigh as she came to a stop, eventually passing out on the smashed concrete, going limp and falling silent…


	12. Chapter 12

Naomi's eyes slowly opened again as she came to, she quickly coughed as she could feel the burn mark flare up again on her leg. She quickly lifted her arm up, placing her palm firmly on the ground as she tried to lift herself. She could feel the dampness of her chest, the small lump that buried itself into her chest that no longer felt like it was a living thing.

She shook her head, furiously, feeling incredibly confused and lost for a moment as she heard the faint stomps of Paladin Danse's power armour, marching towards her.

She looked down at the infant, who spread out in her arms, his eyes were closed and he bore a number of cuts and bruises. Naomi almost immediately gasped, feeling like she was going to choke on something, only there wasn't anything tangible to choke on…

Remembering the course she took, whilst pregnant with Shaun. Naomi rested three fingers on the infant's chest and pressed down, she had to try and revive him somehow, she had no idea how else she would be able to do so. She began compressions, giving three faint pushes on the infant's torso but before she could insert air into his mouth, she received a heavy blow to the shoulder, knocking her straight to the ground.

Naomi cried out on Impact, rolling over as she fell down to the ground and looking up on her back as Danse marched towards her, raising his laser pistol. Naomi reached down for her back, quickly trying to grab her revolver, that was tucked in the back of her pants. Danse fired at Naomi's shoulder, singing it and causing her to cry out in pain and writhe around on the floor, the synthetic man just watched, unfeeling as she did so before he took two steps forward and placed his foot on her chest to pin her down. Naomi grabbed hold of his leg, with a tight grip, grunting in both pain and desperation as she tried to get free. Danse, however, didn't seem to notice as he slowly raised his laser pistol up to Naomi's head and wrapped his finger around the trigger.

Danse didn't get a chance to fire as he was hit, square in the chest by a shotgun's burst shot. He lost his balance and stumbled back, desperately grabbing with his arms to try and stay upright. Sadly, his assailant didn't seem to have sympathy for him and shot him square in the chest, sending him flying back, through the air and landing on the floor, with an earth shattering thud.

"You wanna shoot my girl, you're gonna have to go through **me.** " Hancock said, through gritted teeth as Omar was snapped and Hancock loaded two shells and snapped the double barrel shotgun shut again, firing both barrels at the Synth.

Danse rolled over to his right, quickly sitting up and firing two shots, using his laser rifle, at his Ghoulish opponent. Hancock quickly ducked away and reloaded his shotgun, throwing himself down to the ground in a roll as he slipped both bucks into the shotgun and snapped it shut.

"Hancock! He's a synth!" Naomi called out, bursting into a coughing fit and shaking her head, getting a quick nod at Hancock as he raised his shotgun, pointing it up at Danse with a stern glare in his eye.

"I fuckin' knew it..."

He blasted at Danse again, blowing his left arm off of his power armour and sending the pieces of armour bouncing across the concrete. Surprisingly this didn't slow Danse down as he swiftly looked over to the Ghoul, blasting at him several times with his laser rifle, prompting him to get up and dart off as he slammed two more shotgun shells inside Omar and snapped it shut, running towards the Paladin whilst blasting at his chest. Danse continued to blast at Hancock, winging his hip but the Ghoul just grip his teeth and snarled as he jumped up at the Paladin's face, wrapping his blistered hands around his eyes and pressing his thumbs down in them.

Danse cried out as he felt the pain almost immediately, he stumbled back and punched Hancock in the ribs, prompting the Ghoul's hand to slip further down his face. Hancock felt a second and third blow, eventually prompting him to reach up and sink his teeth into Danse's ear and pull back as he eventually leapt off, narrowly avoiding the third blow but ended up receiving an even greater one, in the form of a knee into his stomach.

The Ghoul was lifted off of the ground, by the force and was eventually returned to it with an almighty thud as he curled up there, grunting in pain as he writhed around, gritting his teeth as he shambled back to his feet, spitting the severed ear that lingered between his teeth across the concrete as he drew his modified revolver, spinning the internal feed mechanism and manually stopping it with his hand.

"Time to end you, **freak**." Danse panted, putting another fusion cell into his rifle and pulling it into place.

"Bah, who you callin' 'freak?" Hancock chuckled as Danse slowly began to circle him, hoping to get a better shot.

"Only one of us was grown in a tube..." He pointed out before raising his revolver up and quickly getting Danse in his sites, pulling the trigger.

"And it wasn't **me!** "

Danse's torso hit the bullet and it buried deep inside the armour, though not deep enough to actually reach the frame. Danse retaliated by blasting at Hancock with his laser rifle, shot after shot was thrown at the ghoul as both red lasers and lightning fast .44 rounds shot through the air.

Hancock fired the last of his magazine at Danse's head, narrowly missing it and getting the Paladin to duck to avoid it as it flew past. Hancock let his spent casings fall to the ground as he glanced over to the Power Armoured Synth, who didn't seem to anywhere near close to being done with his rounds. Danse continued to fire at Hancock, getting him to duck down and stagger out of they way before he broke into a sprint and leapt upon Danse again, this time drawing his knife, trying to drive it into his head. His attempt was foiled, however, by Danse's power armour assisted fist, which pounded him in mid air and sent him flying several feet, towards Naomi and the downed infant.

Danse slowly stormed over to him, shaking his head as he readied his laser rifle, lifting it up and taking aim at the Ghoul, ready to reduce him to ash. Several gunshots were emitted from behind him, prompting him to turn around and start blasting with his laser rifle at a tattered machine stood behind him, blasting several .38 rounds at him out of his pip revolver.

Nick was aiming for Danse's fusion core, though he'd obviously botched the shot as it didn't seem to be doing anything. As Danse turned his back to Hancock, he glanced up and tried to examine it, wincing as he noticed that several gunshots could be seen around the Paladin's fusion core.

The Ghoul drew his own revolver, seeing exactly what Nick was aiming at. He unloaded it and began to place bullet after bullet into the mechanism before snapping it shut and pulling the hammer back, trying to get a shot in as he slowly pulled himself up to his knees.

Valentine leapt back as the butt of Danse's gun was swung at the Synth's torso, prompting him to lift his gun and take several shots at the Paladin's chest. Most of them were fruitless as .38 wasn't much an upgrade from BB as far as most were concerned and that was against someone who was barely armoured. Hell, if Nick wasn't trying to distract Danse, he would've just run but sadly that wasn't an option.

Danse began to reload, shoving another fusion cell into his rifle and pulling its latch back as he got ready to shoot. However, Hancock's revolver fired a bullet into his back, causing him to stumble forward before another bullet was shot into his back, this time coming from Naomi's gun. Naomi's trembling hand managed to miss but it kept Danse off balance so that Hancock could have another shot, hitting his back again and again until he could see the Fusion Core glowing orange.

"Nick, move!" Hancock called, shooting Danse once again as the Synth ducked back, falling into the tattered remains of a building as he could hear the warning alarm start to bleep. Danse, obviously panicked, decided that he had few seconds to achieve his objective, which was far more important than his own preservation. He broke into a sprint and ran towards Naomi and Hancock, though quickly made a B-Line for the Maxson Child. If Naomi's fall hadn't killed him, this surely would...

Hancock's eyes widened as he saw what he was doing and began to fire at the paladin, though his shots merely bounced off of Danse's armour. Danse seemed dead set on reaching the infant before detonating, despite the overwhelming pain coming from, what used to be, his right ear.

"Danse, no!" Naomi screamed, pulling the trigger again and feeling her stomach sting in recognition as it merely clicked.

" _Open Fire!"_

Naomi tried to look over her shoulder as a mass of gatling lasers and laser rifle blasts flew over her head, bombarding Paladin Danse repeatedly and stopping him dead in his tracks as he took on the brunt of the assault as the lasers belted him repeatedly, pinning him to the spot as the heat from the lasers caused his Fusion core to heat up even further and start beeping even faster.

Naomi gasped as she saw how close her was to the baby, if it was still alive, he could still, potentially finish it off. Without thinking of anything else, she quickly scrambled onto her hands and knees and crawled across the concrete, rushing over to the Maxson child's side. Hancock reached up for her but by the time he could reach, Naomi was half way there, several feet away from the critical Fusion core. The alarm frantically beeped as she ran past it and drew closer to the infant, though it managed to run out of time. Within the blink of an eye it detonated, erupting into a huge fireball, sending Naomi flying and causing everyone else to duck and cover as pieces of armour flew across the concrete, skimming the floor as they whizzed off in different directions.

Within twenty seconds it was over, the burning frame stood at the centre of wreckage, with it's charred inhabitant still burning inside it, slumped forward inside the burnt out suit. Naomi lay a few feet away from the infant that she tried to protect, that seemed no worse for wear, whether it was alive or not.

Naomi coughed heavily, her face was incredibly dirty from the explosion but she herself didn't look terribly wounded. She had a few cuts and bruises from the impact, though it was nothing that she couldn't fix up with a stimpak or two and a few day's bedrest.

The Brotherhood Soldiers quickly burst into the scene, drawing their weapons onto the group members as they tried to pull themselves up, all except Naomi who was still coughing and rolling around on the floor.

"Both of you, hands on your head!" A Brotherhood Knight barked, dragging Hancock by the scruff of his neck and dropping him on his knees, besides Nick, who lowered himself willingly. Their hands slowly lifted onto their heads, though Hancock did mumble about how stupid he felt doing it as he constantly glanced over to Naomi.

The Scribes quickly examined Danse's body, immediately stabbing at it and carving it up as they went to a very specific place. They quickly drew a cylinder device from Danse and tossed it to the most senior looking member of the crew, who examined it carefully.

"Hmm..." He said, pocketing it.

"Looks like you lucked out, he **was** a synth." He said, readying his gun.

"Though, who are you freaks? A ghoul... God knows what you are." He said, looking to Nick.

"Some sort of... Synth?"

He slowly turned back to Naomi, furrowing his brow.

"Both being lead by this woman, wearing a pipboy..." He said, looking over to a scribe.

"Examine her, tell me what you can about her."

"Yes sir!" The Scribe called as she rushed over to Naomi's side, quickly rummaging through her pockets and looking the Sole Survivor over as Hancock sighed heavily, looking up to the three scribes trying to resuscitate the lifeless infant.

"I'm Hancock, Mayor of Goodneighbour and **she** is the reason that that baby of yours ain't a pile of ash right now."

"I didn't ask for your opinion, freak!" The Paladin snapped before looking back to Naomi.

"What's the status on the child!"

"We're resuscitating him!" The Scribe called out, getting the Paladin to shake his head.

"We... Saw the situation from afar, Paladin Danse is... Was a respected man, it wasn't easy to shoot him like that but it was necessary for the survival of the Maxson child." The Paladin said, looking back to Hancock.

"You said that you're a Mayor of a town? Most raiders wouldn't take up such a title, so I'm going to assume that you're civilized... What of this synth though?"

"I'm Nick Valentine, a Detective in Diamond City." Nick said, glancing up to the Paladin and meeting his gaze.

"I was investigating the case of the Maxson child, my associates were helping me."

"Why the hell should I believe anything that you say? You're a walking example of technological misuse!"

"Yeah? And you're a walking example of an asshole." Hancock grumbled, getting the Paladin to glare down at him.

"You watch your mouth, Ghoul. I swear, I wouldn't lose a wink of sleep if I saw it and the rest of your head fly off!"

"Big talk when your opponent is on his knees, still, it might interest you to know that I'm not _completely_ helpless..."

The Paladin quickly glanced to him, narrowing his eyes.

"What do you..."

"I've been followed... By dozens of my people, well equipped, pretty well trained by your's truly." Hancock explained, giving him a faint smirk.

"I don't think I'd give liquefying you a second though." he said, giving him a grin.

"Now... Maybe you should start by lowering that gun and hearing us out..." Hancock began, getting a heavy sigh out of the Paladin as he did so.

"I'm... Willing to entertain that." He said, trying to scan the buildings surrounding him for snipers, he couldn't find any but somehow, he didn't get the feeling that the Ghoul was bluffing and he didn't feel like it was worth gambling the lives of his men over it.

"Good..." Hancock said, looking over to the Detective, his smirk grew as he did so.

"Nick?"

The Synth nodded and took a breath or at least sounded like he did... He then looked up and collected his thoughts before he began his tale.


	13. Chapter 13

**A:N/Here we are, end of the line...**

 **Thanks to everyone who followed this story and left comments, reviews and supported it. Really, it means a lot to me and it keeps me going.**

 **I wish that I could've ended on a more exciting note, I feel like I slipped up not extending the last chapter, rather than doing this section of the story as it's own. I felt like I was inbetween a rock and hard place here, between an underwhelming last chapter and a neckbreak twist or turn of events or some other cheap way of making the last chapter count. In the end, I went with what I felt worked best.**

 **So, here's the last chapter of Peace and Future Cannon Fodder, a story that was only originally meant to be five chapters. xD/**

The Paladin said nothing, after hearing Nick's account... He sighed heavily, shaking his head in despair as he knew he'd have to decide what was going to happen next.

"You and your... People have displayed a great amount of... Courage and Honour, bringing us this child. Though I still don't trust that I can let you go." He said, quickly turning on them and pointing his rifle at the group.

"No!" Naomi gasped, staggering up to her feet, clutching her sides.

"You don't hurt them! You don't even fucking touch them!

Everything that's happened here, for good or ill is because of me! You want to deal with anyone, you deal with me!"

The Paladin's eyes fell on her as he quickly narrowed them, he was still willing to grant her wish and turned on her instead. Somehow, she didn't seem the slightest bit intimidated by this, if anything she seemed angered even further...

"You murdered our elder and destroyed this Chapter of the Brotherhood. Your crimes are unforgivable..."

" **My** crimes? At least I'm not a human purist, you piece of shit! No, you know what? Screw you! Everything I've done to get here was to save the life of the Elder's Son! I could've had a team of my people, hell I could have done it myself. I could've walked into that bunker and killed the lot of them. Danse, everyone else! Might as well, they were all killed off anyway. But I **didn't** , I didn't do the easy thing.

Now I'm starting to regret it, because you Brotherhood pieces of shit never appreciate any form of kindness. There's no compromise with you, no 'honour' or any of that shit you preach about! So c'mon, you want to shoot me? Try it, just fucking try it. Even if you kill me, the people of Jamaica Plains and my friends will gun you and your people down, sending you and your last hope to keep the Maxson bloodline pure to hell!

So do it, kill your Brotherhood and do me a favour! Because I'm sick of you assholes, I want you **gone** one way or another!"

The Paladin furrowed his brow, by now every Brotherhood weapon had been drawn and was pointing at Naomi, all that awaited was his signal...

The Paladin really did look like he was going to pull the trigger, hell, he probably was, up until he assessed the situation. He eventually lowered his weapon and his head along with it...

"Considering that you did your best efforts to return our people to us, I suppose I can call for an armistice." He said, holstering his weapon as the child was scooped up and carried on over to a nearby hummer.

"But..." He began, stepping closer to Naomi.

"The next time we see you, it'll be on the battlefield. The Commonwealth is not done with us, not by a long shot. When we return, we'll return with advances that will make the Prydwyn look like a weather balloon."

"Thanks for the tip..." Naomi mumbled as the Paladin turned away and began to march towards the group of vehicles. It was probably all talk, hell, it would be all talk for a while as they probably didn't have the resources to pull this off.

Hancock slowly rose to his feet and approached her, stepping in by her side as the group of metal warriors marched away, getting into the back of a vehicle, the doors slammed shut and the engines revved up and slowly slipped away. Naomi found herself fixated on them, she hadn't seen a working car in... well, it felt like forever and it wasn't far off...

She sighed, heavily and slowly turned away, feeling somewhat cheated. This... Really wasn't the closure that she was hoping for but then again, what **was** she hoping for? Forgiveness? Them forgetting her mistakes...

If only they knew how dire it was, how desperate things were now...

"Hey, you okay?" Hancock asked, resting his hand on her shoulder, prompting her to look over to him and see heavily burned face under his tricorn hat.

"Mmhmm... I can get this put right at the Plains..." Naomi sighed, hobbling forward as Hancock stepped underneath her and supported her.

"No shame in askin' for help... Especially after you fought a guy in Power Armour..."

"Heh... A **Synth** in Power Armour..." She said, though she quickly lost her smile as she saw Danse's burned out corpse. It still felt like she'd murdered him... The real him...

"I just wish that... It didn't have to end like that, y'know? That I could've... I dunno, done something to save him..."

"Heh, we could wish all day Naomi and if I had mine, I'd probably wish for another one of them radiation chems."

Naomi chuckled, shaking her head, trust him to say something like that at such a dire time. It's what drew her to him, as a friend and... as more.

"You promised to cut back, Mister..." She said, with a bemused smirk as she glanced over to him.

"Was I high?"

"Yes but that's besides the point..."

As they staggered over to the town of Jamaica Plains, hoping that help was awaiting them. Needless to say, it was. Several Wasteland Settlers came rushing out of the town, to the aid of the settlement's founder and her cohorts.

"Mr Valentine!?" One of them gasped, drawing an envelope.

"One of the... One of the Provisioner came through with this." He said, passing it over to the Synth, it seemed to be an envelope, taken from his office and typed up on a typewriter.

"Ellie..." He said, with a slight smile as he slowly began to tear it apart, using his metalic finger as a letter opener.

"What's it say?" Naomi wheezed, too injured to look up, she figured he'd probably tell her anyway...

Nick furrowed his brow as his eyes scanned the page, as the three of them returned to the settlement, littered with Gen 1 Synth corpses...

"It says we've got a case, Naomi..." Valentine said, with a faint chuckle as he lowered the piece of paper to his side.

"Up North..."


End file.
